Anyone can put up a website for any reason, but most webmasters do it to get conversions. Getting visitors to sign up for a newsletter, fill out a contact form, and buy products or services their site is offering is what gets webmasters going, and web design plays a crucial role in acquiring those conversions.

A website’s design is an essential factor in getting visitors to check it out. Ease of navigation, mobile responsiveness, and the way the call-to-action button looks are just some of the many elements that can either attract or turn off users.

The same goes for color and how web designers use it in their work. Colors are a powerful tool in web design because they make quite an impact on human attitudes and emotions.

With strategic color use, web designers can make a website project an air of reliability. Creating a sense of urgency or making people feel passionate about something is also possible if the web designer uses specific colors in a particular way. Whatever reaction or emotion a website's design elicits from visitors, you can bet that the colors the designer used have something to do with it.

Industrial psychology has a sub-field called color psychology, which revolves around analyzing the emotional and behavioral effects that colors and color combinations produce. With an understanding of color psychology, a good web designer can use certain colors and the human emotions associated with them to trigger specific reactions from visitors. More often than not, the right use of these colors in web design can lead to conversions.

To be able to use color strategically, a web designer must know which values and emotions are commonly associated with what colors. Here’s a guide on some basic colors that you can refer to when designing a website.

Red

Are you working on a page for a clearance sale which will last for a limited time only? Use red to make visitors feel like they have to rush immediately to the store or miss out on the opportunity. When used in marketing materials that scream about huge discounts, red can create a sense of urgency.

Blue

In the business world, the use of blue is common since it projects security, stability, reliability, trust, and intelligence, among other things. Blue is also cool to the eyes, which is probably why many people associate it with calmness and serenity.

Black

Black is elegant, sleek, and glamorous, which is probably why ad campaigns for high-end products use it frequently. Black is great for projecting power and authority as well.

White

The healthcare industry uses white heavily because it symbolizes hygiene and cleanliness. White also represents innocence, purity, and virtue.

Yellow

If you want to draw visitors in by projecting cheerfulness and warmth, then you should use the color yellow in your design. Go a little easy on the color though, because a color as sunny as yellow can get a bit overwhelming.

Green

Websites dedicated to environmental causes typically use green. Green is also popular among businesses that would like to convey decisiveness to potential customers.

There are many colors out there with emotional associations determined by color psychology. Study them, use them strategically, and help improve your conversion rates.

About The Author

Anthony Tisara is the Outreach Manager at My Biz Niche, the go-to Phoenix-based digital marketing agency specializing in effective SEO and stunning web design solutions built to capture your target audience and generate more leads. He enjoys traveling with his family and organizing weekly trivia events with his friends.